Amanda Lee Koe & Olivier Đhénin Hữu
Writer from Singapore, Amanda Lee Koe, and playwrite from France, Olivier Dhenin, converse with hosts Viet Thanh Nguyen and Philip Nguyen.ABOUT THE GUESTS:Amanda Lee Koe was born and raised in Singapore and has lived in New York, Beijing, Berlin and Bangkok. Her debut novel, Delayed Rays of a Star (Doubleday, 2019) was named a Most Anticipated Title by ELLE, Los Angeles Times, Thrillist, and USA Today, and one of NPR's Best Books of The Year. Her most recent book, Sister Snake (Ecco, 2024) was a Gold House Book Club pick, an American Bookseller’s Indie Next selection, and one of Kirkus Review’s Best Fiction Books of the Year. Amanda has received fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts, PEN America, the University of Iowa's International Writing Program, the DAAD Artists-in-Berlin Program, the National Arts Council of Singapore, and the Fóndation Jan Michalski. She was previously fiction editor of Esquire Singapore.Olivier Dhénin Hữu is a poet, playwright and director. Olivier Dhénin Hữu holds a master’s degree in the semiology of text and image from Paris VII and is a graduate of the Conservatoire national de région d'Amiens. He was artistic coordinator of the Théâtre du Châtelet from 2006 to 2008 and then of the National Drama Centre of Bretagne. Olivier was Resident at the Villa Medici - Académie de France in Rome in 2015, winner of the Anne Schlumberger / Fondation des Treilles writing prize in 2018, associate artist at the Scène Watteau since 2022, and now laureate of the French Institute/Villa Saïgon in 2023. His writing focuses on the poetry of language, the mute expression of actions and the silence of characters. By constructing a sensitive and lyrical literary work, centred on the passage of time and the mourning of memory, he aims to touch on the fickleness and fragility of the human being. His work is closely linked to music : several of his works have been adapted by Nicolas Bacri, Karol Beffa and Jacques Boisgallais. Paysage dans l’oubli (From on oblivion Landscape), the opera written and premiered in Saigon, is set to music by Benjamin Attahir. As stage director, he is pursuing a hybrid approach combining text and music, image and movement. In April 2025, a new play, inspired by the Saigon libretto will be premièred at Guimet national Asian Arts Museum in Paris : Partition vietnamienne (A Vietnamese Part)This episode is sponsored by AppLovin. AppLovin’s leading marketing platform provides developers a powerful set of solutions to grow their mobile apps. AppLovin’s technology platform enables developers to market, monetize, analyze and publish their apps. The company’s first-party content includes over 200+ popular, engaging apps and its technology brings that content to millions of users around the world. AppLovin is headquartered in Palo Alto, California with several offices globally. Learn more at applovin.com.
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